Montreal Hospitals Cancel Tests Due To Isotope Shortage

Montreal General Hospital

From The CBC:

Montreal hospitals are starting to cancel important diagnostic tests because of a shortage of medical isotopes.

"There's no escaping it," said Jean Soucy, the head of nuclear medicine at the Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal (CHUM). "It's a crisis and it's impacting directly on health care."

The world supply of isotopes — used in a range of diagnostic tests for cancer, cardiac, liver, kidney, lung and brain diseases — has been cut in half since Canada's Chalk River reactor was shut down for repairs last month.

Read more ....